SeanSeanySean t1_iwh5zz1 wrote
Live in NH, these things do happen around here as well, usually pretty rare though. You end up with an abutter that doesn't want/like the hunting, or firearms discharged close to them, they may not know their own property lines, or the person allowing hunting sometimes overestimates their own boundaries.
I personally don't mind hunting, I have a 60 acre lot on one side of me and a 180 acre lot on another, both owners hunt and both allow other hunters to use their land. I've been here 19 years, and 99% of the hunters are respectful and safe, but I had an incident 9 years ago where my wife and I were in the yard with our daughters and our two dogs and we heard 6 or 7 very close rifle shots, all within maybe 6 seconds, with at least 4 cracking past us, one of which we later found in the tree 5 feet from our front door and 10 feet in front of my kids sandbox. I told my wife to bring the kids in the house, put the dogs on leashes and started heading for the treeline when two hunters emerged from my property directly into my backyard, neither was wearing orange jacket, vest, shirt or hat, one was wearing a plate carrier with spare ammo mags, carrying an AR-10 in his best "tacticool" wannabe military way, slung, rifle pointed down but with his finger on the trigger, the other was just carrying a bolt-action 300 Win Mag cannon, for deer. I lost my cool, asked them what the hell they were doing walking on my property armed, with no hunting colors, one looking like a wannabe paramilitary contractor, and explaining how at least four of those shots cracked past us and I knew they were shooting towards my house from less than 100 yards. They claimed to have permission to hunt back there, that they were unaware that my property was in between the two larger lots, had no idea our house was there and then had the balls to ask me if we saw a deer run through our yard and if I'd be cool with letting them "track through", when I told them absolutely not, one guy tried claiming that I "legally had to let them track an injured animal through my property". I told them that I consider anyone walking on my property armed in tactical gear and not displaying as a hunter as an immediate threat and would be forced to grab a weapon and respond to that threat accordingly. They actually called the police on me, claiming that they were just "innocent hunters" and I was "some treehugger threatening to shoot them". I made them get off my property and told them to go stand in the road waiting for the police. When the police showed up 30 minutes later, they spoke to them first, then they came up to me, I explained what happened, the fact that their 7 uncontrolled rapid shots were clearly fired without knowing or caring what was behind their intended target (my home and yard), the fact that I was outside with my wife, kids and dogs that could have been hit, the fact that they came into MY yard armed, zero trigger discipline, wearing tactical gear with no hunting colors. Officer informed me that there is actually no law REQUIRING hunter orange when hunting on private property, but it's recommended to keep from getting yourself shot, but he also said "you could have legally shot both of them dead and there is little we could have done about it, I'm going to tell them that with the recent changes to Castle Doctrine in NH, they're lucky to be alive pulling something like that, and I'm referring them to the NH Fish and Game warden, they'll likely never hunt legally in this state again".
Now again, stuff like this is pretty rare, but it's idiots like the above that can ruin it for everyone. While we now have two neighbors with ranges & steel targets within 200 yards of my house, both were considerate enough to put large dirt berms behind them and have no homes within 1000 yards behind the ranges, and usually only shoot between 10am and 6pm, neither of us fortunately work nights.
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